Thinking bout these Projectors

[soulsea]

lol, go ahead ... shoot away!

 

[felixgun]

Okay, I had a longish talk with the manager of the install shop and decided on a revision of the original plan.

I'm not going to use the existing H11 Silverstars at all. Low beam is going to be Xenon hid 6000, high beam is going to either be what's in the new housing or H1 Silverstar, DRL/Blinkers = new leds. New install date is Friday ...

... we'll see how all that goes.

6k HID's will kill those silverstars or any incandescent bulb for that matter. This is a way better plan then the original. What LED's/size are you going to use for DRL's/blinkers?

 

[soulsea]

6k HID's will kill those silverstars or any incandescent bulb for that matter. This is a way better plan then the original. What LED's/size are you going to use for DRL's/blinkers?

Thanks Felix, hopefully they'll be bright enough without the retrofit.

Not sure which leds yet, he's calling me tomorrow with ideas ... any suggestion/advice in this regard is appreciated.

 

[felixgun]

Thanks Felix, hopefully they'll be bright enough without the retrofit.

Not sure which leds yet, he's calling me tomorrow with ideas ... any suggestion/advice in this regard is appreciated.

Hasn't that been tried? Just from what I gathered from reading all the threads about projectors, it is that the actual projector itself is what sucks.. not the HID bulb (or stock H1 bulb it comes with) that's used... hence the Depo/TSX projectors to change them out with...

About the DRL's... I used the bulbs sumo recommended in a thread from autolumination's website for the 3157 drl's. I used to have the ebay led drl's but they are not nearly as bright as my new one's.

 

[soulsea]

Hasn't that been tried? Just from what I gathered from reading all the threads about projectors, it is that the actual projector itself is what sucks.. not the HID bulb (or stock H1 bulb it comes with) that's used... hence the Depo/TSX projectors to change them out with...

That is also what has been expressed on this thread. Listen, my only frame of reference is how the stock bulbs were, and how the Silverstars were. If the Xenon HID 6000 on the new housings is less bright than the original GM stock bulbs/housings then I'll take them off and put the stock housings with the Silverstars back in. If the beam strength is equal or greater than the oem bulb/housing combo but less strong than the oem housing/silverstar combo I'll accept that and keep 'em subject to me liking the overall look. lol, does any of that make sense?

About the DRL's... I used the bulbs sumo recommended in a thread from autolumination's website for the 3157 drl's. I used to have the ebay led drl's but they are not nearly as bright as my new one's.

Okay thanks, I'll see if I can get 3157 from a local shop.

 

[felixgun]

That is also what has been expressed on this thread. Listen, my only frame of reference is how the stock bulbs were, and how the Silverstars were. If the Xenon HID 6000 on the new housings is less bright than the original GM stock bulbs/housings then I'll take them off and put the stock housings with the Silverstars back in. If the beam strength is equal or greater than the oem bulb/housing combo but less strong than the oem housing/silverstar combo I'll accept that and keep 'em subject to me liking the overall look. lol, does any of that make sense?



Okay thanks, I'll see if I can get 3157 from a local shop.

Yea that makes sense... i'd love to see you this work out for you because I love those headlights.. are you planning on keeping the halos on or eventually switching to real CCFL lights to replace the stock halo that comes with em?

 

[soulsea]

Yea that makes sense... i'd love to see you this work out for you because I love those headlights.. are you planning on keeping the halos on or eventually switching to real CCFL lights to replace the stock halo that comes with em?

The ccfl halos are brighter?
If so, I'm not really sure ... I like the halo effect but I don't want to 'overstate' it. So I'll see how it looks and go from there.

 

[soulsea]

Hi again ... so I've been thinkin' ...

This is the latest plan which of course will likely change. Actually it's really two plans, or at least one plan in two parts ...

Part 1: Friday I'm gonna have the 'angel eyes' installed with the Xenon 6000 hids, no leds, just my stock blinker/dlr bulbs. Keep 'em on for a month or so and in the meantime, when evryone is asleep, I'll go in stealth mode and get to work on part deux of the plan ...

Part 2. After doing some digging and some research, and talking to a nice guy named Matt at theretrofitsource.com, I came to discover what I hope you will agree is pretty cool long term headlight solution: Retro the oem housings with Bi-Xenon Morimoto Mini H1 Stage III Kit and E46-R extended shrouds. http://www.hidplanet.com/forums/album.php?albumid=90&attachmentid=3925 (more pics in the linked album) and add the blinker/drl leds.

Anyhoot, notwithstanding the stupid amount of money involved in all this, you guys think I'm heading in the right direction? As you can tell I'm learning on the fly here so it's hard for me to tell.

Thanks.

 

[felixgun]

I love your plan. I love the retrofit projector in stock housing idea. Awesome that you will have two sets and you can work on one while one is in. How long will part 2 take? any ETA? who are you getting to do the retrofit to stock housing?

 

[soulsea]

I love your plan. I love the retrofit projector in stock housing idea.

Thanks bud ... I need to do a little more research to get all the elements just right, but I think this will be the sweetest solution/mod long term.

Awesome that you will have two sets and you can work on one while one is in.

Yup, gives me a chance to roll safely, with an interesting look, whilst the 'dream lights' are getting put together.

How long will part 2 take? any ETA?

Not quite sure tbh ... if the temp setup is decent enough I'll take my time to get the real deal right. Probable a couple of months if I were to guess.

who are you getting to do the retrofit to stock housing?

I'm looking at these guys in Richmond: http://customlightz.com but that's not set in stone. There aren't that many shops in the DC area that do retrofits. My plan was to ship them my stock housings, have them assemble the whole package, and drive down (bout 90min) to have them installed.